No, this isn't a post about Microsoft, judging by the title. I'm talking about the Xiaomi M365 electric step. I've been looking lately to use my car way less, partially due to the fact that parking space is very limited at the train station. Getting fines for not parking at designated places surely doesn't help either. It took me a while to obtain a M365 before summer, but eventually I got it. The e-step has an autonomy of 20km (in my case), and this just suffices for the round-trip from/to the station. The step has a maximum speed of 25km/h, which is 'acceptable' : I would have preferred a bit faster, as taking over bikes sometimes takes a while.


This e-step is quite high-tech : it features cruise-control, ABS and KERS, which makes me hardly use the brakes. Cruising at 25km/h really is a blast, and I have really become quite fond at my daily ride with it. Additionally, it allows me to explore different routes, is more versatile than a bike, and can be taken with me on the train (although the size, even when folded, is quite large).


There's a quite active group of 'developers' around this e-step, creating custom firmware which allows to change different parameters such as maximum speed or KERS control. I've tested out a few, but additional speed comes with too much impact on the battery, so that I decided to stick with the official firmware.